Why sneakerheads are leaving eBay for Detroit startup StockX

"Buyers called us out on it, and we dealt with it," Luber said. Each person who got a pair of fakes was taken care of "multiple, multiple times over," and Luber said those customers are now some of the company's biggest supporters. "It's on us to have a process that has redundancies and has ways to mitigate [selling fake shoes]," he said. "I do not know if anyone else could possibly claim they have such a great success rate, whatever that is, 99.997 percent, but even one [fake] creates doubt in some people."

Luber, for his part, said he wants "all the authentication to go away." It's understandable. Shortly after StockX Day, the company opened a second authentication facility in Phoenix to help speed the process along, but it did not help during the holidays. During the shopping rush last year, orders took weeks to show up to customers, if they were not cancelled for one reason or another outright.

"Even one [fake] creates doubt in some people."

For StockX to expand, it will have to open more satellite stations around the country and, eventually, the world. That wo not be cheap. Sneaker manufacturers could wipe authentication out completely by mass-adopting RFID tech to thwart counterfeiters though. Adidas has flirted with it before, but it's nowhere close to mass adoption. Why would sneaker makers spend money on a process that did not benefit them or the original customer, anyway?

"It's not rocket science to go out, get fakes and break them down," Luber said. "You have to build [an authentication] process, but I am not nave enough to think that someone else ca not build that process." For him, the real value of StockX is its anonymous bid-ask model that connects buyers and sellers, which can be used to sell anything online. Authentication is just "a necessary step" to offering that, Luber noted. It's why he is not worried about eBay's move into authenticating expensive handbags.

"We do not even view eBay as a competitor anymore, and I do not think they view us as a competitor either," he said. Then, after a moment, his entrepreneur side made an appearance. "Which is actually really interesting, because at some point, maybe it's a way to work with eBay." It's this type of thinking that might explain why StockX has not given up on selling luxury purses and watches yet. By showing a continuing commitment to broadening its product offers, StockX is likely much more attractive as a business partner.

"You do not need to actually have a whole makeup category just to do Kylie lip kits."

A study of Hun's page suggests something is off. He only launched his Facebook page in 2016, but it quickly ballooned to 9 million "likes", about 80 percent of which come from accounts in foreign countries like India, Mexico and the Philippines.
More »